If Only It Were Fiction

From the London Guardian:

Even the most punitive-minded of voters would surely have been shocked by the allegations that emerged last week from the inquiry into the murder of an Asian teenager in Feltham young offender institution in London five years ago. Zahid Mubarek was imprisoned for three months for stealing razor blades worth just £6 and for interfering with a car. According to Duncan Keys, an officer at the prison, Mubarek was battered to death only hours before he was due to be released because he had been put in a cell with a known white racist psychopath for prison officers' "perverted pleasure". Mr Keys, later assistant general secretary of the Prison Officers' Association, said it was part of an insidious game in which inmates who might attack each other were put together so that staff could bet on the outcome. The combinations included white and ethnic minority; weak and strong; or two prison bullies.